Today we celebrate Ornella Vanoni
Today Ornella Vanoni turns 90. A birthday that this legend of Italian song has decided to celebrate with music by announcing the release, on October 18, of a new album, “Different”. Vanoni, despite her venerable age, is more active than ever in the recording industry. Last year, in fact, she released “Revolutionary Calm Live 2023”. And it is by bringing to your attention our review of that album recorded live that we offer Ornella our warmest birthday wishes.
Ornella Vanoni can do what she wants. The years go by but the charisma of the “Lady of Italian music” remains intact, as does her ironic spirit, which at 89 years old seems not to have cracked. In October 2022, stumbling into a hole, she broke her femur, which required surgery, which followed the one she had already undergone to install a pacemaker (“The same model as Mick Jagger’s” she joked as a guest on Fabio Fazio). Not even this stopped her because a few months later, on crutches, she went back on stage for a 10-date tour from whose recordings her new album was released: a live with theatrical inserts and two unreleased songs, one of which is a duet with Samuel Bersani, who is also the author of the lyrics to the music of the Brazilian Marisa Mount. From the title of the song “Calma Rivoluzione” comes the title of the album: “Revolutionary Calm Live 2023”. In addition to the song with Bersani, also present in a version performed by Ornella alone (only on CD), the album has a further unreleased song, “Walking”, the text of which is written by Vanoni herself.
“Revolutionary Calm Live 2023” contains, in addition to the three studio recordings, eleven live songs, chosen from the most famous of his repertoire, and as many theatrical interludes from the show”Women and music” written by Ornella Vanoni herself with Federica Of Roseall moments between memory and the present, at times funny and in any case marked by irony.
On the musical side, the unreleased song signed by Bersani is a “reinterpretation” of a composition by Marisa Monte, which Ornella, a Brazilian music enthusiast, passed on to her friend Bersani (whom she defines as “the last true singer-songwriter”) who wrote a new text, far from the original. “Marisa’s was a light text – says the Milanese singer – Samuele made it a much deeper one.” For the live part, Ornella proposes some classic songs from her repertoire, signed by great Italian authors: from Giorgio Conte (“Under the sun with the sea”) to Gino Paoli (“A long love story”), passing through Luigi Tenco (“
I fell in love with you”), Pino Daniele (“Soul”) and Mario Lavezzi/Mogol (with “Life” brought to success by Gianni Morandi).
Added to these are the Italian versions of Brazilian songs that have always characterized Ornella Vanoni’s production. For the occasion she has chosen “The appointment” (“it changed my life – he says about his manifesto song signed by Roberto Carlos with the Italian lyrics by Bruno Lauzi – it will haunt me until death”), “Sadness (please go away)” (text and Music by Haroldo Lobo / Niltinho; Italian text: Leo Chiosso)“Samba for Vinicius” (Music by Toquinho / Chico Buarque; Italian text: Sergio Bardotti), “I know I will love you” (Music by Vinicius De Moraes / Antonio Carlos Jobim; Italian text: Sergio Bardotti), “The desire, the madness” (Music by Toquinho; Italian lyrics: Sergio Bardotti).
To conclude the lineup the jazz instrumental piece “If it don’t mean a thing (If it ain’t got that swing)”, composed in 1931 by Duke Ellington and Irving Mills and played for the occasion by an entirely female group, the one that accompanied Ornella on tour (and which therefore also appears on the album), (“To demonstrate that women have nothing to envy men in terms of talent”).
About the version of “I fell in love with you” in the spoken part Ornella recalls how revolutionary this female version of hers was, presented in 1969 at the “Mostra internazionale di musica leggero”, a singing competition that took place in Venice from 1965 to 1981 and which awarded the “Gondola d’oro”, won that year by Vanilla Fudge with “Some velvet morning” and Vanoni ranked fourth. “At that time, no woman had ever been heard singing “non ho niente da fare” or “la notte ti vengo a cerca””.
At 89 years old, Ornella Vanoni, who maintains a remarkable freshness and media visibility, still proves to be in good shape, even live her voice holds up and her physique too (her spirit is indomitable). “Revolutionary Calm Live 2023” once again confirms her elegance as an artist and that of the jazzy arrangements of these songs. An album for an adult audience, refined and fond of what Ornella Vanoni was, an important figure in the music, art and culture of this country, an artist at the same time popular, known and appreciated by different types of audiences.
